LA VERNE, Calif. – The University of Redlands baseball team (25-13, 14-8) led from the first inning on as they upset No. 4 University of La Verne, 15-7, Friday afternoon.

The Bulldogs were helped to a 4-0 lead in the first when Tyler Preece reached on a fielder's choice and Luke De Vries came home on a throwing error. Rylan Morris then scored on a wild pitch for a 2-0 lead. Mark Kirkland would draw a walk and on ball four Preece scored on a wild pitch. The fourth run came on a fielding error at first which allowed Kirkland to come home.

Leading 4-1 Kaiya Saito tripled down the right field line and scored Kirkland and Preece for a 6-1 lead in the third.

The Leopards, though, responded in the fifth with four runs to draw within one, 6-5.

After a scoreless sixth, Morris drove in a pair on a single in the seventh. During the play the Leopard right fielder committed an error which allowed De Vries to come home for a 9-5 advantage. Later in the inning Preece made it 10-5 with a single to center.

Gavin Duenez came on in the seventh and allowed the first four batters to reach, but he recorded a strikeout and got a 4-6-3 double play to end the inning with the lead intact, 10-7.

In the very next half inning Will Cell led off with a solo home run to left before Nate Miller was hit by a pitch, Jake Burgess singled, and De Vries singled to the pitcher to load the bases. That brought up Morris who tripled his RBI total to six with a grand slam to right that put the game to bed, 15-7.

Morris' six RBI are tied for the eighth-most in single-game program history. He also had three hits and three runs scored.

De Vries and Cell also collected three hits while Kirkland had two. Saito and Gabriel Ceja reached base three times each with one hit and two walks.

Duenez bounced back after the rough seventh inning as he got his third win after pitching the final three innings and not allowing a run in the eight or ninth innings.

With the win they stayed tied with Pomona-Pitzer for fourth place, the Bulldogs, however, hold the tiebreaker, so they need to match or better the Sagehens record tomorrow in order to host the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC) Tournament First Round game.

The Bulldogs and Leopards play the final two games of the regular season with first pitch of senior day at 11 a.m.